Distraction Target Selection As you can see now, we have 3 distinct sets of targets to deal with in order to carry out the strikes against our Primary Strategic targets. We have only identified 2 sets, the Early Warning assets and the Primary Strategic targets. Now lets’ determine what our Distraction targets will be. Recall our goal with these targets is not necessarily the destruction of the particular target but rather the dispersal of the potential Luftwaffe intercept response to our Primary Strategic Strikes. However we don’t want to choose targets that have no real strategic value. I try to keep my Strategic Target Pathway in mind when selecting these targets as well as mandatory targeting constraints. Since my Strategic Target Pathway is Power and Transportation I will select Transportation targets for this target set.

So lets’ take a look at the potential targets we might choose for this target set. We have to keep in mind that we don’t want our targets so spread out that we allow a strike force to become the focus of the Luftwaffe response. But we don’t want to crowd them so close together that we allow the Luftwaffe to concentrate their fighter forces en masse against our forces. My main concern is for the strikes that will be in the South Eastern sector attacking Interbrabant and Mazingarbe. They will be in much closer proximity to major Luftwaffe fighter concentrations than the forces attacking Oissel further to the Southwest. I have worked over the Southern area in Western France fairly well and the Luftwaffe has moved much of their assets back closer to Germany proper.

Looking at the map I will select targets relatively close to the Primary Strategic Targets. I have selected four Transportation targets in the general vicinity of both Interbrabant and Mazingarbe. I have selected Antwerp Rail, Ghent Rail, Lille Rail and Courtrai Rail as my Distraction Targets. Also selected are two Transportation targets near Oissel. Those being Rouen Rail and Rouen / Sotteville Rail for my Distraction Targets for that strike. Each is circled with a Blue ring. I must point out that our Recon on all of these targets is also extremely old so we will have to run Recon missions to these targets before we can hope to locate, identify and strike them.

Now we have our complete list of all targets for this Primary Strategic Target Set as well as all the required Recon missions that must be performed prior to executing our operation. We can now go about building the various missions to carry them out. As I have stated many times “There is more than one way to choke a Dog”. We have a couple different options as to how we go about executing these missions. If this were much later on in our campaign we would hope to be working on targets much deeper into Germany. If that were the case we would be forced to plot and run all of our Recon missions on one day then hope and pray for good weather for the next day so that we could carry out all of our Strike missions with fresh Recon. Fortunately for us at this time we are operating very close to our Airfields. So we have the opportunity to run all of our missions, which includes all Recon and all Strikes in the same day. However this presents a different set of concerns. If our Recon missions are not successful in returning prior to the launch of our subsequent missions they will be forced to fly on the level of Recon that is currently existing. So there is a choice to be made.

Mission Planning Yes you read it correctly. We can run all of our Recon in the same day as the Strikes that our recon will support. It is all a matter of timing. You just have to allow time for the Recon missions to return and update your Target Intelligence. You can launch Aircraft at 6:00am. We can launch all of our Recon missions at that time and they will return in time to allow us to then launch all of our Strikes. The Radar Strike Targets are all close in so they can be attacked before your Primary and Distraction Strikes need to launch. You only need to allow about one hour after your Recon missions have returned for the information to be available to your Strike forces to launch with freshly updated Recon for their target. However, you are taking a significant risk by doing it this way. If your Recon mission fails to properly photograph the target and return with their Photo Recon Reports then your Strike forces will be flying a mission with stale Recon information. Which means you may not locate, identify and damage the target. I will leave it to you to decide which you choose to do. For the sake of my discussion I will presume to run Recon the day before Mission day.

Now we have several sets of missions we need to plan. We need to plan the Recon flights to the Early Warning Sites, the Distraction Targets and to the Primary Strategic Targets. I would also strongly recommend you running Recon on all of your Secondary Targets to the Primary Targets as well. I try to set the other Distraction Targets as Secondary Targets for the Distraction Targets if the distance and flight paths between them allow. I don’t want to be flying over heavily defended facilities to do so. I tend to choose the nearest and best alternate target for my Primary Targets as their Secondary Targets. I don’t want my AC flying all over creation looking for a Secondary Target and trading blows with the Luftwaffe in the process if I can avoid it. We could debate how best to do that but that is not the focus of this discussion. That is a topic I will deal with much later. The sequence here should be run Recon to each Target on day 1. Then run strikes to the Early Warning system on Day 2 which should include Recon to all the Primary and Distraction Targets. Day 2 should also include Recon being run to the Early Warning sites struck earlier in the day to assess their operational status for tomorrows missions. On Day 3 you should be running strikes to both the Primary and Distraction Targets to be followed up by Recon of each of these later in the day for Post Strike Damage Assessment. This is basically the flow of your overall routine.

Recon Missions As with any other mission your flight path to and from the target is very important. You want to arrive at the target unscathed to perform your mission. You therefore do not want to be flying over other facilities that are defended with AA. Again we can debate what altitude to use but the fundamental concept is that Altitude is inversely proportional to accuracy when it comes to Photo Recon. The higher you go the less accurate your Recon can be. However at very low levels detection typically equals destruction for Recon AC. So there is a trade off. You can fly at 400 feet which is NOE (Nap of Earth) and “Below Radar” and attempt to avoid detection. I tend to run my recon at this altitude, and yes I do lose AC. But then you do at any altitude. I would prefer being able to assign particular altitudes for specific way points but that feature is not available. So choose what altitude you think is best. I won’t belabor this in this discussion as it is far beyond the scope.

Please refer to the two images showing in great detail the flight path of the Recon Mission to the Radar Site at Woensdrecht. The image showing the flight path passing over the Oil Storage Facility and the Port was generated by the AI. Even without recent Recon on either of those facilities you can bet your bottom dollar that they are well defended with AA. Flying over them is therefore hazardous and IMHO unnecessary. See the image where the flight path avoids the Oil Storage and Port Facility, I plotted that one. I avoid flying directly over all but the Target. I would strongly recommend you consider making the same modifications with all of your flight paths for “ANY” mission. Now you need to plot Recon Missions to each of the Radar sites to be neutralized as well as each of the Distraction and Primary Targets. I would strongly recommend you run Recon to even those targets that have current recon as you may need Recon from today to attack them the next day should your mission fail to reach, identify and strike the target today or on Mission day, when ever that is. I recommend you run Recon on the day prior to Mission day to ensure you have current Recon.

Another note on Recon. Once a Photo Recon AC has completed its Primary Recon mission it may attempt to perform Photo Recon on other facilities it comes near on its RTB flight Path. I have seen Recon AC perform as many as 3 unplanned Photo Recon Missions in the course of one plotted mission. You may want to consider this as you plot your Recon missions in the future. It will save you a few trips over the long haul. The relevant concept being that your Photo Recon AC may attempt to run additional Photo Recon missions on facilities they fly near to after they have completed their Primary Photo Recon Mission.

This image is of the Recon flight path plotted by myself. Notice that the AI plots your flight path across enemy facilities bristling with AA. I would not recommend allowing the AI to plot "ANY" flight path.

Strike Missions You have three different types of missions here to plan. The first being those focused on neutralizing the Early Warning System. You need to shut that down before you begin running any other strike missions. Then you need to plan your Primary and Distraction Missions. The Primary and Distraction Missions need to be planned together as they will be mutually supportive of each other.

Early Warning Strikes Early Warning or Radar sites are very small buildings and hard to find. I use Fighter Bomber AC to attack these. I tend to get better results with them as opposed to the level bombing AC. Besides most all of my Medium and Heavy Bomber AC will be committed to the Primary and Distraction Targets. I don’t want to risk any of them on Radar sites unless I really must. Fighter Bombers can typically fly at the same altitudes as the Heavy Bombers but I don’t run these missions at that altitude. I tend to run them at 8000 to 12000 feet. My guide for a particular altitude is the cloud cover ceiling for mission day. For example if the cloud cover is 40% at 10500 feet I will set their mission altitude at about 1000 feet below that at a maximum of 9500 feet. I typically do not add Escorts to Fighter Bombers for their strikes. With the improvement made by Matrix they now fight back fairly well if intercepted. Keep in mind that this altitude band is appropriate for Western Europe. The farther your missions penetrate into Germany proper as your campaign progresses you may need to modify that if Luftwaffe Order of Battle warrants.

Distraction & Disruption Target Strikes Distraction Targets are those that are meant to be attacked at the same time as your Primary Targets with the purpose of dispersing the Luftwaffe intercept response sent against your Primary Targets. Disruption Targets are those such as Airfields that are known or suspected to operate Daylight Interceptor AC with the goal being that of damaging or destroying these AC prior to or during their Take Off. An airplane damaged on the ground prior to launch is effectively destroyed for that days defense as repairs do not occur until the next day has started. Later on in your campaign these could also be other facilities such as various types of Fuel or Oil sites meant to limit the potential volume of sorties the Luftwaffe can operate in a day depending upon the Strategic Pathway you chose and your success. Attacking Airfields is risky business as they tend to be well defended with a myriad of AA. Since to attack them your AC must Dive Bomb and Strafe, they will come close to the ground and well within range of all types of AA at an Airfield. I would recommend you recon these as well and consider avoiding the better defended fields unless necessary. Again here I build Fighter Sweeps and tend to keep them at the altitudes previously stated for operations involving Fighter Bombers following the same guidelines to set the particular altitude of a mission.

With respect to Distraction Targets I tend to choose other Strategic Targets as previously explained. I use Medium Bombers for these as they are for the most part Transportation Targets. Medium Bombers typically have a maximum ceiling of around 20,000 feet. I tend to use them at altitudes of 16,000 to 20,000 feet. I also add Escorts to them but I make sure to setup all the necessary Escorts on the Primary Strategic Target groups before I start allocating Escorts to these. I apply typically one Bomb Group per this target type and at least one Escort Group if available. If no Escorts are available I consider what the risk they will be intercepted is and if so what the expected concentration is to determine if I should cancel the mission or not. If Escorts are available I stack them starting at about 2000 feet above the Bombers and at intervals of 2000 feet if more than one Escort Group is added.

Primary Strategic Target Strikes This is the Main Course as it were of your Strategic Campaign. These missions are the purpose of everything else that you have done or are doing. Everything is built around these strike missions. The timing and flight paths of all of your Distraction and Disruption strikes as well as all of your pre and post strike Recon missions are built around these. These targets are the primary facilities of the Strategic Target Pathway you are pursuing. These are the targets you are here to destroy. These are the targets that should comprise your “Point Blank” list to destroy German industry. These missions are what your Heavy Strategic Bomber Forces were built for.

Heavy Bombers have a maximum ceiling of greater than 30,000 feet so you have a lot of options here. I tend to use these at altitudes ranging from 20,000 feet to 27,000 feet. As I have stated before I choose not to fly them at their maximum capable altitudes because this “Meta-gaming” or Gaming the Game in my humble opinion and I refuse to do this for this reason as well as others I have already described. I have read through many after action reports of many of the Heavy Bomber Squadrons that flew these strikes and for the most part they are flying in this altitude band. I therefore have determined that it is Historical to fly these strikes within this altitude bandwidth and I do so.

These missions get the primary focus of Fighter Escorts and are as heavily escorted as I can possibly make them. As I have previously stated with other types of strikes I stack my escorts and start stacking at 2000 feet above the Bomber groups and will typically limit my maximum altitude of a stacked escort to around 30,000 feet. However with these strikes I also add Close Escort Fighter Groups to maximize their protection. I am also very careful as to where in the route to or from the target I place escorting groups for their coverage. Remember early on in the campaign you only have a few Fighter Groups that can provide decent escort coverage. Most of those with longer legs are in the MTO and are P-38’s while those in ETO are your P-47 Fighter Groups but have a comparatively smaller escort range or radius of operations. So until you have Drop Tanks or the more advanced models you will be hard pressed to reach targets beyond the coastal regions of France, Belgium and the Netherlands. Reaching Germany with escorted Strategic Bombing formations will be out of the equation for quite some time. So you need to do the best you can with what you have.

In these very early days your concentration and coverage of Fighter Escorts for your Strategic Bombing formations will be very thin. This is why good planning and mission prep are so vitally important in the early stages of your campaign. You will most likely only have one or possibly two escorting Fighter Groups for any one Strategic Bombing Strike. You will also only be able to operate at most two to maybe three Daylight Strategic Bombing Strikes on any given day in a particular Theater, the MTO or ETO. Therefore dispersing Luftwaffe interception is crucial to the success of your campaign as well as your general survival. It will not be before early 1944 that you can expect a significant increase in the number of both Fighter Groups and Heavy Bomber Groups or significant upgrades to your existing AC. So you must plan wisely and prepare carefully as well as learn quickly.

I would caution against grouping all of your Heavy Bomber Groups into one overall Strike Mission at one target facility. There is a point of diminishing returns with respect to accuracy of hitting the aiming point and doing damage to the target. You could form one huge strike formation of over 300-400 heavy bombers and attack one target thinking you are really going to plaster it. You may very well do so, however you would be wasting valuable time and squandering resources IMHO following this strategy. Typically allocating 4-5 Bomb Groups of 20-30 AC each is sufficient to inflict heavy damage to any industrial target. You can still form them up based on flight paths and altitudes as one overall Strike Wing getting to and from the general target area. Doing this I would recommend having several targets clustered very close together at a focal point where your Strike Forces would radiate from to their individual targets and then return to this focal point to travel en-masse to their recovery area. These strikes would generally appear similar as those I have previously shown for Bomber Command in their Night Bombing role. As your campaign progresses and have to fly greater distances to and from your Primary Strategic Targets you may wish to incorporate some of these concepts into your overall strategy for your Daylight Strategic Bombing into Germany.

As with all my posts regarding my Allied Strategic & Tactical Doctrine everything is to be considered "The KayBay Way" and not "The Only Way" or "The Best Way"... but just the way in which I do it. As always, if you follow my advice it may very well lead to your Doom.

My one hope is always that at the very least my input here will give you something to think about and may help you to enjoy this game much more and allow you to immerse yourself deeper into it and bring your game play to a much higher level.

But as always, the point of any game is... Have Fun !!

I have much more to add to this installment but I was concerned that if I waited much longer to get it started on the boards I would not be well received. I will get back with more as my time allows. Which for the past few years has been very scarce. There are many more things I want to discuss with regard to the Daylight Strategic side of the fantastic game and will do so here.

5. The importance of careful selection of targets for air attack is emphasized by the German experience. The Germans were far more concerned over attacks on one or more of their basic industries and services -- their oil, chemical, or steel industries or their power or transportation networks -- than they were over attacks on their armament industry or the city areas. The most serious attacks were those which destroyed the industry or service which most indispensably served other industries. The Germans found it clearly more important to devise measures for the protection of basic industries and services than for the protection of factories turning out finished products.

Very true. I actually have read the entire Strategic Bombing Survey of the Air War in Europe and it is a very detailed and lengthy investigation and analysis of the German Economy and Industry and the various effects of the Allied air campaign against it. The statement you post describes very briefly the reason why I am working a Power and Transportation Pathway on my latest 43 campaign. If you read through my article as I posted after my discussions on Bomber Command I explain these concepts briefly.

However I must point out one fact, I did not build this game and I do not actually know the mechanics to any exacting details. However I have played many of GG's games over the years and I have found that he was always very inclusive and detailed in their structure. I believe I have stated this earlier in this thread, basically if it was possible he typically made some allowance for it. We can debate his accuracy in how he modeled it but it none the less is most likely present in the mechanics of the games. He included the Power Grid and the Transportation and Supply Networks in the game and I therefore conclude that it is very likely possible to shut down German industry by suppressing those facilities and services. Although I am not sure that focusing only on those two groups can lead to victory in this game.

I do agree with you about the altitudes for missions. I have stated many times over this thread that I would prefer to set particular altitudes for way points of the flight paths of my various missions but that feature is not available. I do not think it ever will. So in my experience, outside this game, Photo Recon is best at lower altitudes so that is how I run them, NOE.

With respect to Fighter Escorts, ask away on the general section of this forum because I am just me and I don't necessarily know anything. There are many others in here that easily dwarf my knowledge of this fantastic game. But I will be addressing the forming of Escort missions but in a fairly general sense as I work through this section on Daylight Strategic Operations. However I would be more than happy to post some things to address you query as I work though that section. I work hard not to sound like I am some kind of an authority on this game and try to just share my thoughts and experiences as I see them and leave it to you the community to think about it and maybe even try some of this. Keep in mind my goal is very deep immersion into this game in a historical style of game play. There are some limitations and some costs in doing this. The KayBay Way is not for everybody. Recall from my very first post here my motivation is to help those new to this game or those that my be struggling with it a bit to gain some insight or some ideas that may help them enjoy this much more.

I think what confuses most when they first start running Daylight Strategic Missions is how to actually place an Escort Group on the Bomber Group. How to set the Escort Groups on a particular section of the Bomber Groups flight path and extend their ability to Escort. There are two major features, Delay and actually placing the Escort on the Flight Path. I would read through the Manual that comes with the game on the CD for that. I know people have posted about this somewhere. I was hoping to use screenshots to explain this but as you can see for reasons beyond me I am having troubles now unlike earlier in my thread.

One thing I do want to point out is that there is so much depth in this game that most are not aware of a great portion of it. My perspective in my thread is my unique perspective and very detailed and not for Beer and Pretzel Players. You can put this game on Autopilot and just let it run to conclusion. But where is the fun in that? The fun is in discovering something unforeseen or unexpected and attempting to overcome it or exploit it not knowing if you are on a glide path to destruction. I have been playing this game for many years in both it's original forms, from Talonsoft and in the Matrix version. Both distinctly different and both extremely intriguing.

Please be patient as the time between posting sections will be a bit long as I don't have much time these days to do this. Life has become complex.

Having read the manual, I do understand how to assign fighters to Close or High escort and use the delay command. I am also assuming you could have a fighter group tag-a-long with the follow command? But as you say "How to set the Escort Groups on a particular section of the Bomber Groups flight path and extend their ability to Escort." I have no idea how to accomplish that, so anybody? I am currently cutting my teeth on "Big week 1". So, I have assigned a Spitfire group on the inbound part of the mission as HE. The target is beyond their range, no problem, I have Jugs as CE to the target and back. I would like to assign another Spit group to meet them on the return. How do I accomplish this? I am guessing the delay command, but can't figure out to co-ordinate the Spits take off time and meet the bombers on the return at a point where they can give maximum time in air coverage. Or is this a complete waste of time and I should just use the Spits on fighter sweeps along the bombers return path?

I've done it using delay. By adjusting the delay, you adjust the time the fighters meet the bombers. And you can see graphically in the fighter flight paths which portion of the bomber path they will be able to escort.

You can fine tune where your Fighter Escort Group meet up with the Bombers and where they leave them when you are selecting the Escort Group. When you select to add Fighter Escorts you will see a Green Line overlaid on the Bombers flight path. At one end is a Green Box and at the other end is a Yellow Box. The Green Box is where they join the Bombers and the Yellow Box is where they leave the Bombers. You can use the mouse pointer by Right Clicking on the Yellow Box and moving it along the flight path of the Bombers. Thereby adjusting where that particular Escort Group will be covering the Bombers. This is quite handy when you need several different Fighter Groups or Squadrons to cover a single strike mission as they target is out of Escort Range of any one Group to Escort all the way to the target and back. I would suggest overlapping groups a bit on each leg of the coverage to allow for delays and interruptions to their Escort Duty.

Remember that when a Fighter Group is flying Escort Duty they consume fuel at a much higher rate because they are circling around the Bomber Formation to maintain coverage. Bomber Cruise speeds are like 200-250 while most Fighters have a cruise speed in excess of 300-350 early on and much faster later in the campaign.

By using both the Delay feature and this fine tune feature you can set up pretty robust coverage and reach out pretty far even very early on in the 43 campaign. I would suggest that you just experiment with all these features until you find a configuration you like. I do tests all the time to figure out how to make things work. I have a few campaigns running just for that purpose. Hope I was of some help.

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Excellent work kaybayray,

I've made a lot of small altereations to my tactics based on these works.

One thing I have improved upon but I cant see mentioned, is ensuring fighter escorts on the return legs. Here the bombers are not as organised and I was finding the late arriving Luftwaffe was getting more kills on the way out than when they were more compact and better escorted on the way in. Its a good use for any shorter ranged RAF fighters you can allocate.

Given "Typically allocating 4-5 Bomb Groups of 20-30 AC each is sufficient to inflict heavy damage to any industrial target." How many fighters do you assign as escorts? How many as CE and how many as HE?

Thanks to JeffK for your post, the Spits are going to be on egress escort.

Thank you very much JeffK & Warshipbuilder. I very much appreciate your comments and I am glad that my humble contribution has had a positive effect for you. This is why I have been working so much on this thread. This game is a real tough nut to crack. As the Allies you face a veritable Giant. This is a true David and Goliath game if you will. You have to destroy this Juggernaut with rubber bands, paper clips, tooth picks and spit wads. And the only way is to just keep chiseling away little tiny bits at a time and do your best to stay out of the way of it fearsome fists. Cause if it tags you, man you are going to get put in the Hurt Locker.

JeffK, With respect to your observation of Strategic Bombardment formations on the return leg and the efficiency of the Escorts, this is a very good observation. IMHO what you are seeing is that in the mechanics of a game there must be an accounting for "Stragglers" from any of the formations that are participating in the mission. As in actual WWII aerial combat over Europe when AC are so damaged that they can no longer keep up with their formations they straggle behind or leave the formation and RTB. I believe that the value of damage required in the game mechanics for an AC to be forced out of formation may seem or acutlly be a bit a-historical but I am not complaining. At least it is accounted for. I believe fuel levels remaining or ammo remaining are also included in this situation. The result is that many AC are pulling out of formation and RTB and / or straggling. Now isolated they are easy prey for nearby interceptors. This would also explain why in any mission you see the "Long Red Line" of Stragglers on their homeward bound RTB. We could debate whether what we are seeing in this game is accurate or not but I don't want to do that. That is not my purpose. IMHO there is an acceptable level or historic accuracy to what I see in this game so I am good with it. Just read my Signature, that says it all.

Now that you are aware of this there are some things you can do, providing you still have AC that can be utilized for it. You can add some of your more short legged fighter AC in an Escort leg on that last 100 miles or so as they are approaching or crossing the channel in ETO or in that no mans land in the med in MTO after they have exited Italy.

However this is one of the awesome features of this game, it puts you in the Command position of these forces and you really get a good feel for what these Men had to deal with and the decisions they had to make and why they chose what they did. Otherwise you're just playing Kill The Parachute Spies.

Warshipbuilder, You pose an excellent question. As I stated, 4-5 Bomber Groups consisting of 20-30 AC each is sufficient to destroy any Industrial Target in this game (The possible exception Sub Pens) but what is the appropriate Escort level? IMHO the answer depends greatly on the total distance your formation is going to travel across Indian Country and what the Concentration Level of Luftwaffe Interceptors are across that distance. This is very much directly associated with what JeffK is speaking about.

I have to really take my hat off at the Matrix Crew that did the rebuild of this game and those that still persist in making those needed fixes and building nice enhancements. They had little to go with as the core of the game was much hard coded and there was nobody to define and explain things. So IMHO they have done a fantastic job.

I realize that my reply here is not extremely exacting but there is good reason. Until you get into the spring of 1944 you just don't have a lot to work with. As your Strategic Bombardment forces in the ETO grow your Fighter Groups lag behind severely and don't keep pace with their growth. So you are limited by Fighter Groups. In the MTO your Strategic Bomber forces lag behind your Fighter Groups. Your Bombers are limiting. But this is what the Allied Commanders were facing at the time and it is directly reflected in the game, IE: Arrival Dates and Locations of Units are historically determined. You have little to say about it.

In the ETO you only really have a few large Fighter Groups that are capable of performing real Escort duty. These are the few P-47D-6 Fighter Groups you start out with. You also get some Spit IX's I believe, that can operate with your Strategic Bombardment Groups, but their operational ranges are even smaller than the Jugs. So until you have a much larger Fighter Group fleet to work with you are basically limited. The Jugs are limited to an Escort Range of I believe 179 miles, which I disagree with but I believe it is so because I do not believe the rate of fuel burn during Escort duty is differentiated from that of standard flight. I may be mistaken as I did not have anything to do with the mechanics of this game. But the Jugs actually had a much longer Escort radius but were limited by Policy rather than Physics.

What I typically do under these circumstances is to apply 1 P-47D-6 (48 AC) Group to High Escort (+2000) and the Spit IX's (20 AC) to High Escort (+3000) but place them on particular locations of the Flight Path depending upon the mission and build 3 Strategic Bombardment Groups that I can get out close to the Ruhr. Or if I need to engage a target at longer range I will divide my Jug Groups up and build them on one larger Bombardment Group. In this later method I can greatly extend my operational range, but at great risk IMHO. These force will run a veritable Gauntlet and my losses will most likely be high.

Later on in the campaign when I have much more to work with I will try to build my Strikes such that at all times I have at least 1 group at +2000 & +3000 or +3000 & +4000, and if Fighter Groups are available I will keep 1 Group at Close. However putting Fighter Groups at Close Escort is my last slot to fill. You are not looking at this until very late 1943 to early 1944. When you get there now you have a different problem set to deal with. I have my reasons why I fill the Close slot last. The reason being, having actually piloted a few different types of AC in my very young days I learned.... Alt = Options, or, Inertia + Gravity > Inertia - Gravity as it were. More simply put +E > E-, E being Energy of motion, Inertia. It is much better to Gain Energy diving on an enemy than Losing Energy climbing up to an enemy. There was a phrase coined in WWII by Fighter Pilots, "High Blower Engages". That is the basis for my placement of Fighter Groups on Escort duty.

In the early phases of the campaign you have a lot of AC with very little range so you have to work close in. Your equipment is very poor so you have to be smart how you deal with the Luftwaffe so I Distract, Disrupt, Seduce and Bushwhack. Later in the campaign you are pretty much eyeball to eyeball with the Luftwaffe and there ain't no place to hide at 25,000 feet. Every mission is a Gauntlet. The only way to persevere is to work over German Industry and limit the ability of the Luftwaffe to engage you in numbers. If you have done well by mid 1944 you should have seen the tide turn. You should be on a more equal footing with the Luftwaffe and now you can use stronger forces to spread them out across Germany. I will address all of this in future postings on this thread. All in due time. I do not want to get ahead of myself here. I am trying to keep this thread in some form of a chronological progression of a typically 1943 Grand Campaign. Remember my way is one of extreme deep immersion into the game. If you are looking for "Reginald D. Steiners' Fast Rules".... this ain't it.

Thanks again for a nicely detailed answer. I shall take what I have learned from you and hopefully apply it successfully. I understand what you are saying Height = Life. Better to be looking down upon your enemy, than looking up. I shall now spend some time fighting my way through Big Week. I will let you know how it turns out. This is going to be a blast.

Just about all his airfields. He was able to convert all his day fighters (and night ones too) in a day or two in January 44. Good thing is he can't build any now because he's got no aluminum and I am within 200 p of knocking out his ball bearings too.

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Appear at places to which he must hasten; move swiftly where he does not expect you. Sun Tzu